FRA Administrator Szabo Set to Leave
Szabo said in a Nov. 6 memo to FRA employees that he will depart in January to return to the Chicago area and become a senior fellow at the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning.
He has been FRA administrator for six years.
“Safety is the North Star for this agency, and your relentless drive for continuous safety improvement resulted in a near 50% reduction in accidents and injuries over the past decade,” Szabo said in the memo.
“We achieved an all-time record best for rail safety in 2012 — and then achieved a new record best in 2013. And our work is not done until new record bests in safety are achieved,” he said.
As a 38-year veteran of the rail industry, who began his working life at the Illinois Central Railroad and became legislative director for the United Transportation Union, Szabo said he’s proudest that fatalities for railroad employees have dropped dramatically.
There have been five so far this year compared with 26 in 2008, the year before he took over as FRA chief, he said.
Szabo also touted the agency’s work in the past six years in developing the nation’s passenger rail services.
“Despite the lack of a predictable, dedicated funding source for rail, we worked with our state partners to advance a foundation of sound transportation planning and a high level of project readiness,” he said.
Over the past year, the safety issues the agency has addressed included efforts to more closely regulate crude oil shipments, although the agency shares oversight with another agency within the Department of Transportation, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.
No acting administrator has been named to replace Szabo, and FRA officials said they did not expect that to happen until Szabo’s departure.
With Szabo leaving, President Obama now has six agency posts to fill within DOT. The nominees will have to be confirmed by the Senate.
Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration head Anne Ferro left in August, and Obama has not said whether acting administrator Scott Darling will be nominated to succeed her.
The other agencies with acting administrators are: the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration, the Federal Highway Administration, the Federal Transit Administration and the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.
